


The Meditation of Blood

by Laura JV (jacquez)



Series: Echoes [3]
Category: Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: M/M, Vulcan ritual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1999-12-31
Updated: 1999-12-31
Packaged: 2018-01-04 10:12:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1079741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jacquez/pseuds/Laura%20JV
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His hands flash.  Blood flows.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Meditation of Blood

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for Shore Leave (1999) and read it at the TSU party. It is also a special present for Fizz, because I know sie wanted a sequel very much.

I wake up and reach for Spock, but he isn't there. For the past week, I'd been sleeping in his quarters, letting him keep me sane. Hoping there was something more there--I don't know. I know him so well, and yet I don't know him at all.

I never would have thought the cold Vulcan I met that first day on board could speak so softly, so gently; could understand my pain and be so willing to help me heal. I never thought he would be my friend, even when I dreamed of him as a lover.

His space on the bed is cold. I wonder if he leaves at night regularly, maybe to avoid me and shield himself from my dreams. I doubt it, since this is the first time I've woken up alone, here.

My eyes adjust to the dark slowly, and I see him, kneeling on the meditation stone. He has his knife in his hand, that long wicked knife he was holding the first night I came here, and his black robes are nowhere in sight.

I can't look away.

The knife moves, reflecting light from the firepot. Spock moves, his hands white in the darkness. Behind his hands and the knife, blood flows. He chants, his voice low and soft and fast, and the knife moves again. His hands flash. Blood flows.

The blood is black in the dim light, and he has two slashes on his right shoulder, parallel to his collarbone. He passes the knife from one hand to the other, twirling it in the air, and the quick white blur of movement leaves another trail of blood.

The chant has become singsong, and the knife moves faster. Over his chest, his shoulders, his arms and then, with a flicker of the pattern, his face.

Across the forehead, along the cheekbones, straight down from the eyes to the jaw--and I realize he has opened his eyes. That he sees me, and knows I see him.

The knife never breaks its rhythm as he rises, slicing horizontal lines across his stomach, crosshatches on his chest. The knife moves. The hands flash. The blood flows.

He advances.

The cuts on his face have bled into his eyes and mouth, and as he moves towards me, I see emerald highlights in the black.

I have never been so afraid, not even when his counterpart forced his way into my mind.

He opens his mouth, and his teeth gleam through the blood. I see fangs, the fangs of a beast out of hell, and I hear it snarl, feel its breath on my face--

"Leonard!"

He's holding me, and I'm soaked in sweat and shaking, my face pressed into his meditation robes.

"Leonard."

I can't move. I'm afraid that if I look up, I will see the beast. He pushes me back and meets my eyes. "Lights, thirty percent," he says, and the room lightens to a soft gray. I can still smell the tang of blood in the air, but I force myself to look at him.

He looks...as he always looks in his robes. Severe and alien. "I'm fine," I manage, and he lets me go.

"I will get you some water."

He stands and disappears into the next room, and I hear the hum of the small replicator. I'm still shaking, and I can barely hold the glass when he hands it to me.

There's something wrong with his robes, something not right. I study him, trying to puzzle it out, and then I notice the smudges of emerald on my glass.

Oh God.

I touch my face where I rested against him, and my fingers come away sticky with his blood. I look past him to the stone, and the knife is there, its blade dulled, the stone itself stained green and black.

I jerk away from him, spilling my water on the bed, and he watches me without saying a word.

I swallow hard. "Spock."

He doesn't answer.

"Spock. You--I saw--"

He inclines his head, ever so slightly. "Yes. I apologize. You should not have had to see that."

"What...what the hell was that?"

He quirks an eyebrow at me. "The Meditation of Blood."

"It, ah, doesn't seem...logical."

"It does to me."

"Ah." I stare down at the water on the bedclothes. I can feel it seeping through to my skin. "You--your face--you were bleeding."

He unseals his robe, and it falls to the floor with a wet sound, and I realize it is saturated with blood. The light pants he wears underneath are emerald from the waist to mid-thigh, and his chest--

While he is streaked with blood where the robe was, there are no wounds. No marks at all. I look up at him, unable to keep the fear out of my eyes, and he shakes his head.

"You should not have had to see that, Len."

And he reaches out, touches his hand to my shoulder, and before I can protest, I feel myself lose consciousness. As I slide under, I hear his voice again, from a long way away, but I can't make out the words.

I wake up when the alarm goes off, and he's still asleep, one arm around my waist.

His robes are gone, the stone is clean, and the knife hangs next to the sword, and for a moment I believe it's a dream.

I look down at the hand that rests, so casually, on my skin, and I see the fingernails--Spock's usually immaculate fingernails--are stained with blood.

\-------------

 

The End.

**Author's Note:**

> Back on ASCEM, we would (manually) put categories on the stories, sometimes. This one had the following note on it:
> 
> "Category: weird"
> 
> ...yes, well. I don't have a note of the exact posting date, but it must have been in 1999, because this story won: Honorable Mention, Best TOS single-part; Second Place, Best S/Mc, 1999 Golden Orgasm Awards
> 
> Also, upon reflection, the characterization of McCoy in this series is just peculiar, and Spock is kind of creepy.


End file.
